A variety of health and sanitary products exist in the form of creams, pastes, and gel. Materials of this consistency are also found with construction, maintenance, and mechanical arts as well as in arts and crafts in various forms of adhesives, paints, lubricants, and cleaning materials. It is helpful to fashion a container for such materials which permits quick and easy dispensing and then resealing of the container in order to protect them from exposure to air or other adverse environment or to prevent breakage. Such containers frequently are used for toiletries, such as toothpaste. It would be helpful to have the ability to compact the storage area for travel or shelf space.
A variety of prior art devices have made efforts at solving this problem. There are several varieties of pump canisters. These are generally characterized by a chamber to hold the fluid which can be compressed by depressing a bottom or other leverage device. The dispensed material is forced out through a one-way valve or perhaps a capped or sealed opening. The opening may either be automatically closed, or it may be sealed and capped by the user. Such devices incorporate moving parts and require assembly with respect to the compression apparatus and may also have such parts with respect to the valve. U.S. Pat. No. 4,508,239, issued to Royzen on Apr. 2, 1985, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,258,864, issued to Karamanolis, et al, on Mar. 31, 1981, are examples of such devices.
Other varieties of such devices include an outer container and an inner, compressible, container. The outer container contains or buttresses a compression force and the inner container holds the material to be dispensed. The material may again be sealed off with either a one-way valve or by some other form of sealing and capping apparatus. U.S. Pat. No. 4,099,651, issued to yon Winkelmann, on Jul. 11, 1978, is an example of such a tube.
Well known and long used in this are simple tubes wherein one end of the tube is permanently sealed, or closed (perhaps by heat fusion or the use of adhesives) and the other end is adapted with a capped opening. The material may then be forced out through the capped opening by squeezing the tube. Many such devices are made with a foil material. As such, the tube surface is pliable yet, after squeezing, will hold its new shape. This prevents undesired air or other fluid material from building up within the chamber.
The use of foil presents a unique problem. While foil is pliable and bendable, it also is subject to splitting and tearing. After being bent back and forth several times at the same place, or if a given spot is bent too forcefully or radically, a foil tube may split or tear and permit leakage. An advantage of foil is that the closed end of the tube may be rolled up towards the open end so that, as fluid is squeezed from the tube, the closed end may be rolled up and the size of the tube may be compacted for storage. This also makes it easier to squeeze additional paste or fluid from the tube.
Recently the use of plastics and vinyl materials has become more widespread in the packaging of consumer goods. With respect to such tubes, it offers several distinct advantages. First, it is less costly than foil. Second, it is lighter and more plentiful than foil. Additionally, it is easier to work with than foil. Such tubes could easily be made from plastic or vinyl, either through the injection molding process or by heat fusing sheets of plastic or vinyl together.
Unlike foil, however, plastic or vinyl will normally be resilient and, after squeezing is complete, will tend to spring back to its original shape or configuration. As a result of this, the tube will draw air or other fluid back into the container when squeezing is complete to fill in the space left by the evacuated paste or cream. Accordingly, this precludes the space saving benefit of foil tubes.
Additionally, the paste or cream will be free to drift about the interior of the tube. As a result, it will frequently be necessary to shake or manipulate the container in some way in order to force the paste or cream into position near the opening to be squeezed out. Even so, it may be necessary to position the tube with the opening down in order to ensure that the paste or cream does not flow back into the open spaces of the tube. This also makes it difficult to apply pastes or creams to surfaces which are either vertically-oriented or downward facing.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,576,314, issued to Elias, et al on Mar. 18, 1986, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,105,985, issued to Kroeber, on Apr. 21, 1992, each teach means and apparatus for assisting in the solution of this problem. Elias teaches a tubular sleeve which is adapted with a roll-up channel and winged winding shaft. The closed tube end may be positioned within the channel. As paste, cream, or gel is squeezed from the tube, the shaft can be turned and the emptied tube can be rolled up within the tubular sleeve.
Kroeber teaches an insert within the tube to inhibit the backflow of air or other undesired gas back into the tube. Kroeber does not teach a means of storing or positioning the emptied tube.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,365,727, issued to Shmelkin on Dec. 28, 1982, teaches a device specifically developed for use with plastic tubes. It comprises a hinged apparatus through which the closed end of a tube may be inserted. It further comprises a roller and channels for assisting in squeezing the tube and then sliding the emptied portion through. Contact with a roller is meant to facilitate thorough squeezing of the fluid from the tube.
Kroeber does not teach means of handling the emptied tube. Elias and Shmelkin each require moving parts and a separate apparatus. Neither Elias nor Shmelkin permit a user to ensure that all of the fluid material has been squeezed from the tube. While it is likely that this would naturally occur in the use of the Elias device, it can be seen that fluid could remain in the tube while passing under the roller of the Shmelkin device.
What is needed, but not provided by the prior art, is such a low cost, lightweight, tube for pastes and creams which will achieve the utilitarian advantages of pastes or creams and preserve the cost and manufacturing advantages provided by the use of vinyl and plastic. It would be particularly helpful to provide such a tube which would so function without the use of additional or moving parts and to conserve storage space.